Man of Terris, Man of Honor
by Estel POI
Summary: Sazed hears Khriss being assaulted and soon finds that the perpetrator, Odium, is taking over the universe. A trip to Roshar doesn't go smoothly: Cultivation wants him to leave (to not destroy the planet in a Shardic battle). He is stronger than she is, but she is wise and subtle. Why has she chosen to meet him in a cave with Talenel? FOR BRANDON SANDERSON FANS IN NEED OF CLOSURE.


**Man of Terris, Man of Honor**

Introduction:

This is for people who are in desperate need of closure and are tired of waiting for Brandon Sanderson to wrap up the next _Mistborn_ and _Stormlight_ books. I am one of those people. I hope this story is food for your spirit like writing it was for mine.

Warning: **DO NOT READ** this story unless you have read at least the first _Mistborn_ trilogy and _The Stormlight Archive_. This story contains **SPOILERS** for the first _Mistborn_ trilogy, _The Alloy of Law_ , _The Stormlight Archive_ , and _White Sand_ parts 1 and 2.

Main character: Sazed

Characters: Sazed, Talenel, Cultivation, Khriss, Adolin, Trell

 **Prologue: Adolin**

Adolin ducked into the cave. Near the back, Talenel muttered his mantra. " _I am Talenel'Elin, Herald of War. The time of the Return…"_ He remained in the cave, after all this time, because attempts to move him seemed to cause him distress, and he seemed to find the confines of the cave reassuring.

"It's me, Adolin, this time. It's my turn. Last time I was here I was covering for Kaladin's turn visiting you."

The cave was changing. Vines grew from the stone floor, birds flew in and out, and the air was filled with a heavy, oxygenous smell like air after a rainstorm or deep in a forest. The stranger thing, though, was that people who came into the cave came out cured of minor ailments and injuries. That had begun some time after they left the Herald in the cave.

Adolin wasn't here for the curative properties of the area - for those you really only needed to go near the cavern - ; he was there because he always felt like he had spoken of his problems to a wise friend when he left. He needed that more and more since the death of his father Dalinar. He was endlessly grateful that his father had died at peace, in bed but awake, instead of in a frenzy on the battlefield or half asleep from drink. He couldn't _feel_ gratitude yet, but that might come. He came to understand he should be grateful only from visiting Talenel's cave. Maybe soon he would understand what to do. He would have struggled to deal even with ordinary enemies, and Odium was another matter. There was another reason he came: he was grateful to Talenel for keeping Odium at bay for thousands of years of torture at his hand. There could hardly be more to be grateful for.

He sat down on the ground near the Herald. "Nice, cool day, isn't it?" The Herald did not reply.

Adolin took a deep breath. He'd been wanting to show Taln something. Shallan thought it was dangerous. She thought Taln might be distraught by the sight, and it might worsen his condition. Adolin thought Taln's condition couldn't get much worse, but could get better. So he took a long, thin bundle out from under his arm and began to unwrap the shardblade.

"This is mine," he said. "At least, I own it. I'm not sure it's _mine_ , really, since I'm not bonded to it's spen. The spren is dead, see. It's been dead since the Knights Radiant broke their oaths. Now I carry it, though I no longer train with it, since that hurts her."

Taln continue to mutter, turning his head slightly toward Adolin.

Adolin continued. "I was wondering if this was around in your time. I mean, I know your blades came from Honor, not spren, but I don't know how shardblades really work. Were there spren while Honor was still alive? Did you ever see this at any of the Desolations?"

Taln's eyes came into focus, staring at the sword. "I know. I know where that came from."

Adolin contained his emotion so as not to upset Taln. "From a Desolation, or the other possibility I said?"

Taln looked confused. "You haven't said anything, son."

He gently took the blade from Adolin and examined it. "Yes, I know what this is. I knew its bearer, one of them, centuries before the Recreance." He handed it back and shrugged. Adolin was burning with curiosity but made himself wait.

There was no point in seeming too interested in the sword, since he had made a decision.

"This sword is yours, Taln. You should have it. I've met the spren, her dead version, and I think… I think it would be better if you had her, because you come from before the Recreance, when Honor was still alive. If she's with you, she'll be with someone who's imbued with Honor's… essence, I guess. At least that's what I hope. And I think she deserves a rest. Maybe this will make her less unhappy."

Taln took the sword. He looked it over, saw the gemstone embedded in the handle, and raised an eyebrow. He gripped the gem between two preternaturally powerful fingers and plucked it out.

Then he tossed the sword in front of him.

Adolin jumped. The sword spun through the air, and transformed slowly into the eye-less spren Adolin had met in the cognitive realm.

"Taln…," it muttered.

"It's all right." Said Taln. "We're both in the physical realm. I'm a broken man, you're a broken spren. At least we aren't being broken anymore. I think that's something to be grateful for."

"Wh... Why did Deverin hurt me?" The spren asked.

Taln sighed. "He didn't want to. He found out the truth about the voidbringers, Aenn, and he couldn't bear to destroy the world. If he'd sworn more specific vows, maybe vows to prevent evil rather than to protect from evil, you would live."

"I think I live now…," Aenn said.

"Maybe you do. Probably. You could not outlive Honor. Honor lives in the hearts of men. You could only live in the world while bound to a knight of Honor, or in the keeping of a man infused with Honor himself."

Adolin gulped. He had a suspicion Talenel's honor, his honorable enduring of torture for millennia for the sake of his vow, had something to do with his ability to heal an honorspren.

Partially heal honorspren. Aenn's eyes looked like dots, and she looked weak and washed out.

"I need to sleep." Talenel said. "I don't know if I will ever wake up, but if I do, I will tell you how the spren is doing."

Adolin stood up and walked toward the mouth of the cave as Talenel slid sideways down the wall and half-closed his eyes, muttering parts of his mantra under his breath.

 **Chapter: Sazed**

Sazed stood studying Elendel from the perspective of the cognitive realm. People were changing the way they thought of things, but it had had little effect so far. Then he heard screams. _Help me! Help me! Oh please, I need help. I need, I'm dying, oh help..._

Sazed froze, focusing on the direction of the sound. Centuries ago he had directed his perception so that his attention would be especially attuned to worldhoppers and to people whom only he could help. This voice was both. It was coming from within the cognitive realm, from somewhere near Roshar.

Sazed flew toward it. He arrived in minutes, and by that time the screaming had faded. When he arrived at the scene, he saw a glowing man standing over a bleeding woman. _Glowing_ was not really the right word. Glowing things emit light. This being sucked in light, emitting darkness.

"Who are you?" Sazed called to the being. It spun around and said "Odium, of course. Unless you are here to pay - " It's eyes found Sazed. _Harmony!_ It hissed, and vanished.

Sazed found the woman. She bled from many wounds, and her flesh in places looked as if it had been brutally twisted. She was no longer screaming, and she seemed to be regaining consciousness. She muttered incoherently, then tensed, looking terrified at something that wasn't there, then began muttering urgently. Sazed ran his hand over her face, healing the worst wounds and cleaning away the blood, saliva, and tears. Then he examined the rest of her, healing the worst wounds first, then the others. It was tricky to heal her internal injuries, many of which were bizarre and unnatural. They should have been impossible for anyone outside of her body to inflict.

Once he had healed and cleaned her, he repaired her clothes to give her a little dignity. She still muttered incoherently, staring through sightless eyes. Sazed took an earring from his ear. _"Sorry,"_ he whispered, and quickly pierced her ear with the tip of it. She did not flinch until several seconds later.

With the hemalurgic spike in her ear, Sazed could see her thoughts. He could see her mind, and, to a limited extent, her soul. He laid his thumb on her earring, and began to heal her invisible injuries. Once in her mind, he understood that whatever had tortured her had somehow invaded her mind as well, twisting and torturing it, and filling it with terrible things. Her soul could hardly bear the strain, and was cracked and bruised.

He healed what he could. He looked down. The woman was dark skinned, and on the cusp of middle age. She was beautiful, and her clothing was elaborately embroidered purple. She was surrounded by what seemed to be leafs from what had been books.

Sazed picked her up and carried her to Scadrial.

In Scadrial, Sazed arrived in a cave he had prepared for people who might need a safe place to rest. It lay a little ways off of a road, and was above a cliff ragged enough to climb. The inside was filled with moss that glowed faintly, and water trickled down part of the wall.

Harmony increased the number of chickens at a nearby farm, then slaughtered one of the extras. He had done all he could do for now as a godlike being to heal her. Since she was still traumatized, he would give her comfort as a human, and hope that would suffice.

Sazed could walk in the physical realm. That is, he could form a body out of dust and inhabit it as a man would inhabit a hand puppet. Usually, it made no difference to people who met him that he wasn't quite like the rest of them, not that he'd met many people in his semi-embodied form.

Back in the cave, Sazed lit a small fire in a crevice and began to make a broth with the chicken. He moved smoothly, avoiding any sudden movements. The woman's eyes followed him, but he could not tell if she was watching him or if her eyes were simply following the only movement in the cave.

Sazed was a kind man, and that would have been enough reason for him to help. But he had another reason; he recognized the woman as Khriss: worldhopper, scholar of the shardic arts, and ageless member of the clandestine organization The Seventeenth Shard. He wanted to know what she could tell him.

 _Three months later_

Khriss was much better. She could talk, though Sazed would not talk to her about disturbing subjects. He was spread throughout Scadrial, though his puppet body remained at the cave, caring for Khriss. She had lost interest in touching his arm, an odd fascination she'd had when she first became lucid. "I've researched things across the universe, by sight, hearing, touch, smell, but I've never touched the physical form of a envesselled shard, much less a di-shardic one," she'd said, but then rubbed his forearm endlessly while staring blankly at the wall. At least she wasn't afraid to touch him.

"I think I should tell you what happened now," she said. "I appreciate your holding off, but I think it's time. I'll survive."

She told him the story. His eyebrows climbed as she explained that Odium, a shard like Ruin or Preservation, was trying to take over the universe. She told him which shards Odium had shattered, and that one of them, Honor, resided on Odium's home of Roshar. Honor had bound Odium to Roshar, but now Odium was slowly slipping out of the bonds. Cultivation, a third shard, also lived on Roshar, but seemed to be unable to stop him.

Sazed had heard some of this before, but he had not heard that Odium was trying to invade the universe. That explained some things he'd been worrying about.

He spent the next several hours in thought. Then he told Khriss, "I'll be leaving for a while, and I may not come back. I think the best chance I have at stopping Odium is to kill his vessel before he escapes Roshar. Once he's escaped, it will be too easy for him to hide. I may not succeed, but if I act now I may be able to stop him before he destroys any worlds, and there is no reason to wait. He is clever and has his spies, so waiting to plan may lose me the element of surprise."

"I am transferring you to the cognitive realm for now. We are too far from a perpendicularity for me to leave you in the physical realm without trapping you on Scadrial. You can wait for me to return, or make your way through the cognitive realm to a perpendicularity. I do not need a perpendicularity to transfer you."

Khriss stared at him, then slowly nodded. She stood and embraced him for a long time, and said, "Goodbye, god. Go kill another god. Save the universe, and don't go die. Some of us are very attached to you, and this world needs you. Probably the universe does." Sazed nodded, took her arms, and lifted her with him into the cognitive realm.

It was a very short distance from Scadrial to Roshar. That was because people seldom thought about the area between the planets. He arrived at the Shattered Plains. It would be easier for him to find Odium if he spent some time in the physical realm asking questions. He transferred.

Sazed was surrounded by merchants, soldiers, and officials. He looked around for someone who might have information that could help him find Odium, and spotted a woman in a brown hooded cloak. Her posture was authoritative, she was looking around like she could modify the things she saw if she did not like the way they were, and people seemed to walk very deliberately either quite close to her or quite far. He approached her. "Greetings, lady. I am from a far land, and I must make your acquaintance."

She turned, and Sazed saw that her skin was brown and freckled with green and her eyes were black pools that somehow seemed to give back as they received his gaze. "Afternoon, Harmony," she said, and turned and began to walk.

"Wait!" He said, but she ignored him. He ran after her and caught up.

"Wait!" He said. "I must talk -" She gripped his arm, and they vanished into thin air.

They re-appeared in a small, dry cave. An emaciated man in thick clothing sat at the back, turning a blade into a spren and back again. He did not look very old, but Sazed sensed he had lived for thousands of years.

"I return your greeting now," said Cultivation. "Ignore the man Taln, he will not harm us. I believe I have you at an advantage. I -"

"I know who you are." Sazed interrupted. "You are Lady Cultivation, shard of Adonalsium, co-possessor of Roshar with Odium and, at one time, Honor."

Cultivation nodded, looking impressed.

"I'm afraid you won't stay long here, Harmony," she said. "I know why you are here. You want to kill Odium. I can't have that. While I am sure your intentions are good, and you have a duty to defend Scadrial, you would likely destroy Roshar in your battle with another shard, and since Odium would fight on his own fields, he would win. He is not a force to be trifled with. You are a shard of balance. He is a shard of whatever he feels like."

"I have to kill him. Or rather, his vessel. If I didn't he would only grow more strong. He has not yet absorbed more shards, but if he ever decides I am a threat, he might begin to to make himself stronger."

Cultivation grabbed his arm in a vice-like grip. "I will not let you do that, Harmony. I have more power here even than you. You are in my home." Sazed tried to break away from her, and she put her other hand around his throat.

"If you want to walk free in Roshar without taking a vow of nonviolence," she said, "you will have to kill me first."

Sazed looked at her, sensing overwhelming power, and knew that she was right: he could not escape her without seriously injuring or killing her. _Very well,_ he thought. _This must be._ He would not kill Cultivation directly, but he would seize her shard. Then he would clearly be able to overpower Odium, and Cultivation could not stop him. Removing her shard by force would kill her, but it was war, and even Cultivation said he had a duty to defend his land.

Harmony attacked. In the cognitive and spiritual realms, once could see Harmony reaching toward Cultivation, feeling her edges; then he reached into her. Sazed scouted out the blurred boundaries between the vessel and her shard. He found the boundary where there was nothing but human inside, and human mixed with shard and pure shard on the outside. He grabbed at the boundary, but found himself forced back. He leaned against her guard. Though he could not evade Cultivation's barrier, with two shards he was strong enough to break her. Slowly they leaned back and forth, in a contest that felt strangely like arm wrestling.

Then he broke through Harmony forced himself in, wounding her, and began to rip her apart at the seams. The shard and the shard/human ripped free of the woman at one edge.

She screamed so loudly he was briefly distracted. He looked down, and saw her cowering on the ground. "Please, please," she screamed. "Don't let him hurt me! Don't let him hurt me, Father! I can feel him! He's _inside_ me. I can't live. I can't live with it. Oh please don't let him take me over! I can't bear it. Oh, oh, oh…."

Sazed relaxed his grip. Then he slowly released her and sighed, hanging his head.

He couldn't bring himself to do this, be it justified or not.

Cultivation had stopped screaming. She was quiet, wiping her face. She stood shakily.

"Sazed." She said. "That was by far the worst thing that has ever happened to me. I cannot express in words how much I do not understand how you could do that. But you _didn't_ do it, so I will give credit."

"When you were ruining me, you could see inside me, but I could also see inside you. Now I can see from your perspective some. I understand why you need to do this. I was blind, because I could not bear the truth. I will _never_ let you do what you just did. You may never come near me, but I will remove Cultivation from myself and give it to you. You will need it for what you are about to do."

Sazed nodded slowly. "I think we may be able to to this without killing you. I think that if you voluntarily separate yourself from Cultivation, you may be able to leave a sliver of the shard attached to yourself. We can ask a cultivationspren to bond with you, and when I am Cultivation, I will infuse you with the essence of that shard. You will survive, I think, though you may go mad. I think that because of Cultivation's nature, the sliver you leave attached to you will heal any injuries your mind and soul sustain.

Cultivation nodded and said, "Before you confront Odium you should search the area for Honor splinters. The Stormfather is the largest splinter, and he is unbound. I think he will let you attach to him, though he may require an oath. You should have all the strength you can get.

With that, Cultivation closed her eyes. Then she reached out with both hands, as if cradling something, and dropped it into Sazed's hands. Sazed received Cultivation, and ascended.

He could feel it. He needed to make things grow, to shape things, to make a vibrant future with patience and care. Preservation resonated with it, as it loved keeping things alive. Ruin also approved, because Ruin loved pruning, weeding, and culling. Each shard of Harmony resisted a little. But they resisted each other in the same ways, so when they conflicted with Cultivation she usually won. Sazed was more powerful than Cultivation had ever been, and he was far more powerful than when he'd been the ever-conflicted Harmony.

He kept his promise. He imbued the old vessel with Cultivation, and summoned a spren to her. The old vessel seemed to be whole enough. He launched himself into the sky, looking for splinters. He did not look for long. The Stormfather was near, and he instantly recognized the other shards. Stormfather came rushing to Sazed. "Who are you? Why are you here in Roshar on the Shattered Plains?"

"I am Sazed, recently known as Harmony. I was vessel of a shard made of the shards Preservation and Ruin. I am still that vessel, and I am also the vessel of Cultivation, by the will of the previous vessel. I come in peace."

"And I am now Syroa, since you must call me something." Said the former vessel of Cultivation.

The Stormfather rumbled. "I find it difficult, if not impossible, to trust in any shard who is not Honor. If you will not leave, I will consider you an invader. I have enough to deal with on my own."

"You do not have to deal with Odium on your own. I know about him, and I am here to attack him. I do not intend to remain on Roshar long. I need all the help I can get until then. Will you allow me to be your vessel? I intend to reconstruct Honor as best as I am able."

"No. If you leave Roshar, you will leave it without Honor. Cultivation leaves with you. I will not."

"If you wish, I will agree to divide my consciousness between Roshar and my home world of Scadrial. In this way, both our worlds may survive."

The Stormfather rumbled. "Very well. I will accept."

Sazed ascended. He now felt far more human than he had since he became Harmony. Ruin tried to destroy the fragment of Honor, but the fragment resisted. So did Preservation and Cultivation, so the Honor fragment lived. Ruin enjoyed Honor's mandate to fight and destroy wicked men and traitors. Preservation chafed at that, but was silenced by Honor, Ruin, and Cultivation. Sazed was mostly ruled by Honor and Cultivation, though as much of his power came from Ruin and Preservation. Fortunately, he was able to choose more freely than Harmony, because his shards were no longer perfectly balanced against each other.

Filled with a power that had not been known for millennia, Sazed scoured Roshar for bits of Honor. He found fragments here and there, and appeared as a spren to men, summoning them to let Honor grow within their hearts and to let Honor bind itself to live with Cultivation, Preservation, and Ruin. He summoned the honorspren, who allowed themselves to be bound to him, with Sazed's expanded human nature as their knight radiant. Their power increased his, and he became more and more of Honor.

That would have to do. Honor was incomplete, but discovering more fragments, and cultivating Honor within men's hearts, would take time. It was time to battle Odium.

Sazed had hardly stopped gathering Honor when he heard a voice. "Come to do no good, I suspect." He turned.

It was Odium.

The shard must have sensed him. No wonder.

"I will never do battle with you, Shards Combined," said Odium. "I may not be several different shards, but I am not a fool. I will flee, and hide in the corners of Roshar, then you will have to search the land for me. And while you are searching, I may attack your beloved Scadrial. Who knows how long Honor's bonds will trap me? I will conquer all worlds. Leave, or this will occur."

"Never."

"What do you intend to do? Lose all worlds while trying to conquer this one, o near-mosaic of shards?" Odium said mockingly.

Sazed narrowed his eyes. Before he could speak, another voice did.

It was Syroa. "I propose this solution. Honor and his kin will send a champion to fight Odium. The champion will win by holding the shard of Odium without becoming attuned to it. He will hold the shard, doing as he pleases with it. If he agrees with the current vessel about the best fate for this world, he will return the shard, seeing that our current Odium has much more experience and will clearly be more able to reach his goal. If not, he wins, and Odium will be his until it acquires another vessel. You will win, Odium, if he gives Odium back to you."

"Absolutely not." Said Sazed.

"Ignore him" Said Syroa. "If we lose, Odium, Sazed will return to his world. He will not return for at least one century. I am no longer Cultivation, so I am of no account."

"I do not agree to this deal." Sazed said. "It is insane."

"I do not think you have a choice." She said. "When Honor lived, he locked Odium inside Roshar. When he was dying, he gave me a key. I now open the lock."

Sazed's jaw dropped. He struggled to collect himself. He could not afford to waste a moment; Odium could flee at any time.

"I select our champion." Syroa said, "As a condition of the deal. I choose Talenel, the former Herald of Honor." She pointed at the man slumped in the corner, who had now began to babble at the wall. Sazed let out a yell of outrage.

"A hundred years, eh?" Said Odium, a smile spreading across his face. "You leave Roshar, and I can be safe from you here for another century, doing as I please, working away…. I accept. If I lose, Culti- I'm sorry, this empty woman can lock the door again. You can attack me all you want once I lose, if _that_ happens."

Sazed saw no way out. If he did not agree, Odium would simply vanish. Sazed could tell that most of Odium's essence was elsewhere. He could not grab Odium on the spot and trap him for the kill. If Sazed hesitated, Odium could flee to Scadrial and destroy it.

"I agree." He said. "If Odium agrees to the deal, I do to." If we win, Odium's vessel will be the property of the man Talenel. If our champion loses, I will leave Roshar immediately, without attacking Odium, and not return for one hundred years. I add one condition: If our champion does not chose to return Odium to its previous vessel but does not master it, Syroa will lock the trap again. Odium cannot be allowed to escape. I understand you require it as a reward for victory to entice you to the game. But if you cannot enjoy it, I will not give that prize away to another. Further, this only goes forward if Talenel agrees. I cannot force this on a man."

"Done." Said Odium. "There is no chance Talenel will win. He is mad. If he attunes to Odium, which he surely will, he will not want as fragile and incapacitated man as himself in charge of fulfilling Odium's will. He will return the shard to me, and I will be king of the universe."

Talenel stepped forward. "I accept," he said quietly.

Odium stepped forward and gripped him by the head. Talenel shook. Then he froze.

Sazed sensed unbridled emotion from around Roshar pouring into Talenel like an ocean into a baby's mouth. Grief, exultation, bitterness, agony, pleasure of every sort, vengeance, shock, hate.

Odium was unbound by honor. The emotions did as they pleased with no regard for duty or bonds of loyalty. No friendship, no ties of blood, no moral code, could stop the emotion from being manifest. No one stood in the way of anyone obeying Odium to stop him from walking on the faces of his brothers and sisters to slake the thirst of desire.

No one but Taln. Mad old Talenel stood with his head down, rocking back and forth. As tears ran down his face, he lifted his head, expression stiff as stone, and said, "It is done. Odium is fully inside of me. He possesses me. He is latched on to every corner of my soul, mind, and body. Time will not increase his union with me. I have done what I agree do to: I've completed the challenge."

He turned. "I now give the shard Odium to Sazed, possessor of three shards and the splinters of Honor, if he accepts, and I give him my vow of loyalty if I survive de-ascencion."

Sazed started to answer and found he could not speak.

"I suggest one thing," said Talenel quietly, "That Sazed wait to receive Odium until he has finished collecting Honor. Odium is meant to submit to Honor, I know this now. He resents being made by nature to be subordinate to anyone, especially to someone who so often thwarts desire. He will fight hard, and Honor has the resolve that other shards probably lack to keep Odium under him."

"But first, please knock me out. I will eventually lose my battle against Odium. That is why I suggest you find Honor. I'm afraid I will lose while you are strengthening Honor. "

"Yes." said Sazed. "I agree." He reached out and drew poison from the nearby plants. Enough to put a normal man into a permanent coma, but enough to put a vessel into a deep sleep. He poured it into a large leaf, and handed it to Taln.

Taln put it to his lips, then froze. He jerked his head back and for, moving the leaf away from his mouth and back. Sazed put a hand on the back of Taln's head and tipped the drink into his mouth. He held Taln's mouth shut until Taln gulped. Taln nodded at him, gratitude in his expression, and Sazed let go.

Sazed traveled from one end of Roshar to another, stirring Honor in hearts, collecting more spren, accepting oaths, and collecting honorblades. He eventually was able to raise the dead spren of the Knights Radiant, since he had more of Honor than anyone else, and was human. He placed the blades in Talenel's unconscious hands, which restored to them their sanity.

Finally, he returned to the cave. "I doubt it will be enough, but it is all I can do." He said. Then he saw Talenel. Sazed's eyes could perceive Honor better than they once had. Taln stood straighter, and summoned two shardblades, one made of a wounded honorspren and one made of Honor. Sazed accepted them both. The spren awoke, vibrant with health. Sazed put all his blades together - he had collected every shardblade, and pressed them to his chest. The honorblades went dark, and Sazed's chest blazed. The spren transformed into human-like beings of light, and drew close to him. Their light increased his, and his light increased theirs.

Then Sazed looked at Taln. Talenel fell to his knees. "Honor, now envesselled." he said. "I vow my life to you, so far as I am able."

"I accept." Said Sazed. "And that is more pleasing to me than a vow of self-deceived false confidence."

Light swirled around the two, brighter and brighter.

"I am complete." Said Sazed. "Honor is complete."

"He lives again." Taln said.

Sazed took Taln by the shoulders, and Taln did the same to Sazed. The emotions that had roared into the Herald flowed into Sazed. Taln let go, and Sazed left him with a sliver of Odium and gave him a sliver of Honor of the same size. Honor would win, as long as it was equal or greater.

Outside, men froze in the middle of berating their children. Women stopped short while buying luxuries they could ill afford. People walked away from their adulterous affairs, looked up in shame from vengeful whisperings, shied away from yet another drink.

They would still have passion. But it would be easier to control now, now that Odium was not sovereign.

Whispering from the mouth of the cave made Sazed turn. A young man in a blue military officer's uniform stood, his clothes oddly stylish for their nature. He mouthed wordlessly, eyes wide.

Sazed looked down and realized he was still blazing with light. He also noticed he could feel his feet, even without meaning to. He shifted his shoulders. He felt _human_. Of course, he also felt a lot of things other than human, but now his body felt real like he didn't have to force it to work. It fit him as no body had since he lost his first one.

Sazed looked around. He heard Syroa laugh. "You feel it?" She said. "It's because you have more human attributes now. You can create more fully. You can also inhabit a body more fully, as human's body are designed for souls with all the attributes of Adonalsium, not just Ruin and Preservation. Also, Cultivation likes to build things and heal."

Sazed noticed something else, something that had not been true since he was a baby. Something, probably something related to the shard Cultivation, had changed his body. He was no longer a eunuch. It felt natural. He did not feel himself a eunuch anymore.

"As someone who has held Cultivation for a long time," said Syroa, "I might suggest that you hold onto that body long enough to get back to Scadrial, then use Scadrian dirt from your hometown to create a body with full consciousness of what you are doing. Build it identical to your original one, minus the aftereffects of injury, illness, and malnourishment, and live in it. Do not change a hair about it; your body fits your soul like a glove expertly tailored for a hand fits that hand. You do not need to be lost to yourself any more than you already are, though you will find it easier to keep your humanity now that you have more shards."

Sazed listened, thinking of what he would do next. He would return to Scadrial with his body, leaving part of his consciousness on Roshar. He would make himself a permanent body and would work throughout Scadrial and Roshar, mostly independently of his body, healing and righting the worlds. He would teach Roshar as he had taught Scadrial, giving them the contents of his metalminds. He would keep his body mostly hidden, using it occasionally to meet with people face-to-face as Marsh did, and living an ermetic life, probably as a subsistence farmer in an unpopulated part of Scadrial.

And he would find Khriss. She would want to know what had happened, and then he would learn from her about Roshar and the other worlds, so he could better teach the Rosharians as their adopted grandfather. She would probably go with him some of the time. That was the best part of his plan, because they could spend time together in a setting that didn't seem like a hospital. He hadn't known how he'd miss Khriss.

Cultivation continued. "Keep an eye on yourself and catch yourself when you are drifting away from the nature of the shards you still lack. You will lose some attributes, which will not be good, but I think with your new shards counterbalancing the others, if you keep a watchful eye on yourself you will be able to remain more or less whole, as much as any flawed man can be, for a long time, maybe a millenium. Now that Odium is gone, perhaps it would be wise to reassess the way Scadrial and Roshar are built. Do not let Ruin or Odium have to much sway. Watch yourself."

Sazed bowed deeply. "Thank you. I can hardly begin to imagine the sacrifice you made to me, an invader and an attacker. It is you, not I, who has saved the universe."

"And Taln, you too." He added a moment later.

Adolin stumbled as a woman came bursting past him into the cave.

"Khriss!" Sazed cried. "What on earth brought you here?"

"Never mind that," said Khriss. "I came as fast as I could. When you left, another god manifested himself. He's taking over Scadrial, though I think he's been hiding there for centuries at least. I've heard of him on other planets. I don't know when he left for yours, but this Shard is not familiar in any of the Seventeenth's collections of notes. Except that we knew we'd missed one. His name is Modesty, and his vessel is Trell."

Sazed and Syroa looked at Khriss. For one silly moment, Sazed wondered why there was a Shard focussed on wearing plenty of clothes. Then he realized that obviously modesty meant more than proper clothes. Not calling undue attention to oneself in word or action (or dress), being willing to keep quiet and concealed (or at least unnoticed) without regard for pride, vanity, ambition, love of attention, or other foolish motives: that was the broader, accurate meaning of modesty.

"So he's trying to take over the world?" Said Sazed. "That seems rather improbable for a Shard whose sole motivation is _not_ to act like a rooster. But on the other hand it _must_ be him since he's had the… well, modesty to stay hidden and out-of-the-way since before the Lord Ruler, and fairly little-known before then."

Maybe _that_ was why Scadrial had had so many religions. None of the three, _three_ , shards there would demand worship while influenced by Modesty himself.

The woman Syroa laughed softly, and they heard a gasp from the entrance.

Adolin still stood in the mouth of the cave. He finally found his voice. "What _are_ you? And what are you doing to Talenel? Are you a ghost, or are you alive?"

Khriss answered Sazed, "When I say he's 'taking over,' it isn't some fest of carnage like Ruin would do. Not that it's Preservation either. He's removing ostentations: displays of wealth, awards, political stadiums, and even some inventions the inventor made for honor-I'm sorry, vain glory. People are all really quiet and wear subdued clothes. They've stopped showing off, and they're starting to wear veils or masks."

Turning again to the baffled man in the entrance, Taln gestured dismissively to indicate to Adolin that he was safe.  
Sazed stepped forward and said, "I am Honor. I live."

 **The End**

 _There may, one day, be a sequel…_ _._


End file.
